


Staring at the Sky

by hereforwords



Category: Naruto
Genre: 5 ways Naruto sees Sasuke, Basically, Fluff, Fluff without Plot, Light Angst, M/M, Mutual Pining, and 1 way Sasuke sees Naruto
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:42:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27272116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hereforwords/pseuds/hereforwords
Summary: Looking at Sasuke felt like looking at a star.The idea should have been ridiculous, but putting his real meaning into words felt even more impossible. Sasuke could have been bright like a star, when they were younger in his undeniable talent and now in the simple stunning fact that he was actually back home by Naruto's side after so long, but Naruto didn't find Sasuke bright. When Naruto looked at Sasuke he didn't want to squint, and his eyes didn't ache with fresh dots of light from the sight of him.Bright things always hurt, and though it felt like holding a crumbling cliffside with only his fingertips, Naruto had quietly started to believe that Sasuke was finally done trying to hurt.
Relationships: Uchiha Sasuke/Uzumaki Naruto
Comments: 9
Kudos: 108





	Staring at the Sky

**Author's Note:**

> this has been my go to fic to mess around with when i'm stuck on other stuff, but since i'm doing nano next month (💀) i decided to finish it up. hardly any plot here folks, just lots of feelings, have fun friends

Looking at Sasuke felt like looking at a star. The idea should have been ridiculous, but putting his real meaning into words felt even more impossible. Sasuke could have been bright like a star, when they were younger in his undeniable talent and now in the simple stunning fact that he was actually back home by Naruto's side after so long, but Naruto didn't find Sasuke bright. When Naruto looked at Sasuke he didn't want to squint, and his eyes didn't ache with fresh dots of light from the sight of him. 

Bright things always hurt, and though it felt like holding a crumbling cliffside with only his fingertips, Naruto had quietly started to believe that Sasuke was finally done trying to hurt.

Some people looked at stars as symbols of hope, a physical manifestation of their wish in the sky. Sasuke had been close to every wish Naruto had ever had, a years long chase with a thousand false starts, gaps in the track, impossible distances Naruto could have never imagined jumping until the moment he was in the air with nothing but far off ground beneath him. Naruto knew now that he'd always put himself in the air, and that wishes and hopes could never match up to the whole shape of a person, especially when that person was Sasuke. 

But still, sometimes Naruto looked at Sasuke and could only see the distance behind his eyes, the years of weight on his shoulders that Naruto would never be able to lift. All he could ever think was how completely untouchable Sasuke was right there beside him, like an imagine from the past that would never hold its shape if Naruto dared to reach out and touch, a phantom flash against the night sky from thousands of years ago, just like the stars in the sky. Some days Sasuke would burn bright hot, like he really did hold the heat for an entire world inside himself, and others he seemed to be nothing but a long dead star, cold and in pieces floating through the vastness of space. 

Right now Sasuke didn't look like a star of any kind to Naruto, for maybe the first time. Right now Sasuke looked so human Naruto's gums ached like he'd ate nothing but sugar for a week, something that a distant far off point inside of him that he'd always managed to ignore before now wanted to call needed. Naruto didn't know which of them he thought needed it, what it even was, but even just letting the edges of the idea touch his mind felt dangerous like the riskiest missions had never managed. Naruto was a moment away from just turning around in bed all together to take away his ability to look at Sasuke at all when Sasuke shifted, the simple act enough to freeze Naruto in place again.

He hadn't meant to watch Sasuke like this, hadn't even considered it when cracking his eyes open in the middle of the night, woken by a dream that was really just another memory. Naruto had rarely stayed in an inn on a mission before so the ability to relax and just sleep was near impossible, waking up in the middle of the night regardless of if he was on a mission or not never even much of a surprise anymore. Naruto had glanced to Sasuke's bed beside his own in the moment just after opening his eyes, the way he always looked over to Sasuke now. Naruto felt like he would never tire of it, getting to turn and see Sasuke without a fight between them and an aching bruised body as the only thing holding him up. 

But Sasuke wasn't in his bed.

In the half of a second it took Naruto's eyes to find Sasuke standing by the window in the dark he thought of countless possibilities, each more pointless and panic inducing than the last, so the pure _something_ that flooded his chest the moment his eyes landed on Sasuke didn't feel that out of place. It was only in the long moments after, so long you couldn't really call it a moment at all anymore and the feeling hadn't so much as flickered inside of him that Naruto couldn't pass it off as simple misplaced relief.

He was drifting in the sea on dry land, lost to the waves of moonlight dancing on the edges of Sasuke's darkened silhouette, drowning in the small bit of bare neck he could see, knowing the exact face Sasuke must have been making, head tilted forward enough for him to be hidden behind a curtain of dark hair. Naruto was probably the only one who knew what shaking doubts were hidden away there, fear bigger than the anger it was usually wrapped inside of. The idea that Sasuke still felt that way when he thought he was hidden away alone in the dark made Naruto want to rush to his side, but he didn't move. Sasuke thought he was alone after all, at least in all the ways that mattered for a moment like this.

Sasuke had already shown Naruto so much that never had hope of seeing the light of day with anyone else around, the hidden curve of his smile just as he started to turn away, the relaxed set of his shoulders as he leaned back on his hands after a long day of training, his eyes crinkling shut as he yawned, loud and unashamed of how it made him look. Naruto could fill up an entire world inside himself with all the tiny shades and hidden soft corners of Sasuke that he and he alone had been shown, and still. And still.

When Sasuke shifted again Naruto's breath caught, that small sound enough for him to know there was no hope Sasuke hadn't heard, but the waves beneath his ribs felt like an outright storm now, lightning beneath his palms and thunder rattling his lungs that pushed a sigh out of him before Naruto could remember all the reasons he was supposed to hold it back. The sound took away the sight that had caused it to begin with, Sasuke's profile caught in the strange warm colored moonlight, but Naruto couldn't remember how to miss it in the next. Even when he was caught staring in the dark, some part of Naruto would always love the moment their eyes met, and this was no different.

Sasuke just watched him back, eyes as dark as the night sky behind him before he turned away again without a word. Even knowing Sasuke knew he was looking now Naruto still couldn't make himself close his eyes, to finally search for the sleep that he knew he needed. It would have been impossible for him to sleep now anyway. 

No longer worried about being discovered, Naruto pulled back his blanket and sat up, his bare feet on the cool floor waking him up all over again as he came to stand beside Sasuke. It was too easy to find what was usually hidden away behind a glare of indifference, sadness right there for Naruto to see. But maybe he just knew what to look for after seeing it all so many times before.

"You didn't need to get up." Sasuke's voice was quiet, like he still had to worry about waking someone up when they were the only ones in the room.

"I've been awake."

Sasuke finally looked over at him again. "Nightmare?"

Naruto shrugged, wondering how he could explain years of sleepless nights to the source of most of them without causing offence. "Missions have made it pretty much impossible for me to sleep all the way through the night, I don't think I even remember the last time I did."

"Yeah." Sasuke swallowed, looking down at the window ledge. 

For a long moment after they didn’t say a word, just Naruto watching Sasuke look up at the night sky, giving up on doing anything else now that Sasuke knew and seemingly didn't care. Naruto had always assumed Sasuke never noticed him watching before, but looking at him now Naruto could only feel like a fool for ever thinking Sasuke could miss a thing, when he still clearly didn't know how to let a single thing go.

Naruto would have held any weight for Sasuke, any burden or struggle if he just knew how, if Sasuke would have ever given them a name so Naruto could claim them for himself. But Sasuke had been through so much Naruto could never dream of touching, let alone taking into his hands. All he could really do was be there, just like he'd always fought for. Naruto just wished it ever felt like enough.

"When I was very young my mother told me when someone in our family died they became a star." Sasuke's face was tilted slightly up now, a funny curve to his mouth as he looked at the bright flexs across the sky. "I let myself believe it for too long."

Naruto had to remind himself to breathe, longing like an endless cavern inside of him, with a thousand rooms he'd yet to find. "It's a nice idea, everyone up there together like that."

"But they aren't really together, are they? Stars are all so far apart." The emotion was right there in Sasuke's voice now, like a third person in the room with them. "Stars are always alone."

"You're not," Naruto said before he could think, reaching out to hold Sasuke's wrist, as close as he could ever seem to get now, finding a pulse going faster than he was ready for beneath his thumb. "You're not a star Sasuke."

Sasuke didn't pull his wrist free like usual, and when he met Naruto's eyes again there was a warmth there Naruto hardly ever got to see. "Not yet anyway."

"Even when you are, you won't be up there alone." Naruto kept telling himself to drop Sasuke's wrist but he couldn't seem to make it so, his thumb just barely rubbing back and forth along the soft skin of Sasuke's inner wrist. 

"How do you figure that?"

"Cause I won't let you. Well be–I don't know, twin stars or something."

Sasuke's eyes widened just slightly, glancing down and away before looking out the window again, lips slightly parting in a sigh so soft Naruto was half convinced it was only imagined. Then he pulled his wrist free, gently, but away all the same. "Maybe we already are."

_ What? Family? Destined to die together?  _

Naruto felt that all too familiar feeling creeping up his spine, an old fear that had no place between them anymore, but it had nowhere else to go. "What do you mean?"

Sasuke shook his head, carefully not meeting his eye. "Nothing."

"It doesn't seem like nothing."

"It's what it always is Naruto." Just like that he was a star again, ancient and untouchable, so far off Naruto had to strain just to see him at all. "Some things never change."

"Sasuke–"

"I'm gonna try and sleep again."

Words Naruto hadn't found yet dried up in his lungs, mouth stale and useless. "Yeah, probably a good idea."

And just like that it was over, Naruto's palm still burning with the lingering heat of Sasuke's wrist beneath it. Maybe someday he would learn to make it be enough, but looking up at the star dotted sky through their small room's window, Naruto couldn't imagine ever making it so.

*

Today Sasuke was like a river, rapids crashing against Naruto time and time again, soaking into the sand of his hands until he was all Naruto could feel, dripping down onto everything. Training with Sasuke always felt like swimming against the current, no moment to breathe, no moment to hesitate before he was being pulled back under again. It was exhilarating like nothing else had ever been, a rush inside that Naruto could almost taste, like if he just kept fighting, just kept pushing he would finally find an air bubble hidden away beneath all the waves.

Even though he'd won more of their matches today than he'd lost, it still didn't feel like enough. "Again?"

"Not all of us have endless energy." Sasuke's breath was heavy, his face slightly flushed as he tilted it back to look up at the sky, hiding that dusted pink skin from Naruto's view. "You won more today anyway."

Naruto didn't feel like he'd won, but he knew there was no reason for the weight inside of him that he could begin to explain. It was hard to feel like enough when he was looking at Sasuke, especially like this. Even admitting defeat he still looked unbeatable, a river frozen over all at once, so clear that all Naruto could want was to reach out and touch his surface, knowing it would only lead to frozen over fingertips. 

Sasuke met his eyes again, eyebrow just barely raised. "What?" 

Naruto blinked. "I didn't say anything."

"Exactly." Sasuke took a step closer as he gave Naruto a quick once over, which for him was openly suspicious behavior. "You always brag, at least a little bit."

Naruto felt himself start to match all that pink, felt the rivers current try to pull him under. It took a moment to remember why he couldn't just let himself float away. "Are you saying you want me to brag? Cause I can brag, I just kicked your ass and I'm not even tired." 

Sasuke's expression didn't change at all, but somehow it was brand new. Maybe his jaw wasn't clenched quite so tightly. Maybe some of the tension left his eyes. Maybe it was nothing at all. "See, that wasn't so hard."

Naruto's laugh all but burst out of him, lighting up inside when Sasuke actually let himself smile back, brief and small as it was. The part of him that always pushed himself to take another step, jump across the cliff blind to where he could land was daring him to believe that Sasuke was smiling now just for him, that Sasuke was only smiling because Naruto was there to smile back at him. But even crystal clear water left a trembling, turning reflection on the surface, any stillness only a trick to the eye. Naruto moved to hold his wrists behind his back, the irrational urge always growing inside of him to reach out and make the waters still again too much. 

Sasuke wasn't smiling anymore, instead looking at Naruto with so much focus that Naruto couldn't imagine turning away, but he couldn't imagine surviving another moment of it either. He never knew what to do with himself when Sasuke actually looked back at him. He never knew what to say when Sasuke questioned him seemingly out of nowhere like this.

"Why don't you have a girlfriend?"

Naruto felt like he was choking on air. He couldn't decide if the feeling crawling up his back was amusement or horrifying embarrassment. "The normal reasons, I guess."

Sasuke looked completely unimpressed. "What are the  _ normal reasons,  _ I wasn't aware there were any."

Naruto shrugged, wondering if it looked as awkward as he felt. Going from Sasuke never talking about anything like this to whatever this was turning into was like a dam bursting over his head, leaving Naruto underwater before he could even turn to see it coming. "I don't know. No one wants to date me?"

Sasuke looked completely incredulous. "Are you asking me if that's true?"

" _ What? _ " Naruto cleared his throat roughly, ears burning. "No, I just–"

"Because it's not. I can think of at least three girls who would say yes if you asked them out right now."

Naruto shrugged uselessly, looking down at the ground between them just to pretend he could breathe again. "Why are you asking me about this? You literally never talk about stuff like this."

"Neither do you."

Naruto opened his mouth to argue only to realize that he couldn't, closing it before daring to look back at Sasuke again. He was watching him the way he had a thousand times before, and the way he likely would a thousand times again, like Naruto was the slowest person alive and was lucky that Sasuke graced him with the air from his lungs. It would have been completely ridiculous to love the sight the way Naruto's heart was claiming he did right now.

"You realize you're proving my point by saying nothing."

"I just–what do you want me to say?" Naruto could hear the panic just beginning to creep up behind his words and tried to push it back, but he just wasn't ready for this. They couldn't talk about this, not them, not when Naruto was still just barely treading water. "I've never been with anyone, so it's not like I have a lot to say."

"There's no one you would want to be with?"

Naruto ran a hand through his hair, searching inside for any answer he could stand to give that wasn't a lie. He could only look away from Sasuke for a moment before his eyes went right back, again and again without a thought from himself to do so. "I don't–I just don't want to talk about this."

Hurt washed over Sasuke's expression, gone again just as quickly. "Fine."

"Come on, are you seriously mad now?"

"I'm not mad," Sasuke snapped, so clearly mad all over Naruto almost wanted to laugh for a flash of a careless moment. 

"And I'm not avoiding the subject."

"You–" Sasuke did the closest impression of a fish he would ever let himself make, mouth open before he visibly remembered himself, biting his lower lip for a moment seemingly suspended in time before he looked away with a sigh. 

And again with his careless heart. "I'm not keeping anything from you."

Sasuke glanced up at him through dark lashes, his voice flat. "No?"

"No." Naruto wished the word alone could be enough but knew they weren't, not for someone like Sasuke. More than anything Naruto just wanted to be enough for him, even if it wasn't in everything, even if it would always leave him sunburnt from the water's reflection. "I'm just, I don't know. I don't care about girls the same way I–I'm just not ready yet I guess, I don't know." 

Something in Sasuke's eyes relaxed, harsh black rocks turning to smooth pond stones. A perfect circle of ripples. "It's okay not to be ready."

"Oh," Naruto let out, not quite managing to keep the quiet surprise from his voice. 

Another sigh. Some days it felt like Sasuke was having an entirely separate conversation in sighs alone. But this one didn't sound bad. "Fine, yes."

Naruto blinked. "Yes what?"

"I'll let you take me to get lunch."

Naruto was halfway to responding before he finally caught on, smile catching before he could hope to stop it, not that he ever would. The last thing he would ever want to hide from Sasuke was when he made him happy. "Can we get–"

"No."

"But I won!"

"We had it last time we trained, I want something else."

"What else even is there?" 

Sasuke was walking ahead of him now, leading them to wherever he felt like eating apparently. Naruto watched the back of his head shake, took in the easy line of his shoulders. "You're such a moron."

Naruto's face hurt from smiling, currents and reflections gone like they hadn't been pulling him this way and that for months, just like that. "Wow Sasuke, I don't think you've ever called me that before. Very original."

*

Somedays Sasuke reminded Naruto of one of the stray cats that roamed the village, not that he would dare to ever say it out loud. It was something in the way Sasuke moved, relaxed but on guard, with that look behind his eyes that always made you want to reach out, regardless of the scratch sure to be waiting for you. Naruto had tried to adopt a stray cat when he was younger but he'd gone about it all wrong, chasing the cat down instead of waiting for it to be ready to meet him.

Naruto had told himself he was finally trying to wait now that Sasuke was home again, but the more time that passed the thinner and thinner the excuse grew inside him, stretched down to single threads just waiting to get scratched to bits. Maybe Naruto was finally tired of all the tiny cuts. Maybe it was all finally just too much for him to ignore anymore. 

Or maybe they both just really, really hated the cold. "This mission is awful."

Sasuke just grunted, still not looking away from the path, not that there was much of one left to see between the snow on the ground and in the air swirling all around them. It was so cold Sasuke had frost on his eyebrows, which Naruto knew because he'd bothered to look over at Sasuke in the past hour. They were walking in a straight line, there was no reason for Sasuke to be as dedicated as he apparently was to what was ahead. All Naruto could see was endlessly twirling white.

"Sasuke," Naruto said again, leaning forward as he looked so there was no way to deny he was in Sasuke's line of sight, close to the very last thing he needed to do. Poking the cat with a stick.

"What?" Sasuke still wasn't looking, and the word hardly sounded like a question.

"Sasuke."

Most of Sasuke's face was hidden away behind fabric, but the bit of skin at the top of his nose scrunched up for a brief moment, the way it only ever did when he showed his irritation openly. Sasuke was always so much more expressive when he thought no one would notice. 

But it finally got him to look. "What?" 

Naruto smiled, even though his lips were chapped and far too cold to be moving at all. "This mission sucks."

Sasuke's eye twitched. It was easy to imagine him sighing beneath the scarf. "Naruto, I'm cold. I'm tired. I think, despite the fact that you've said it eighty-seven times, I actually hate this mission more than you do. Please just shut up so we can get there." 

Naruto figured now was as good a time as any. "You know there's no way we can make it today, we have no way to tell how far we've come but we can't be even close to getting there yet." 

Sasuke did sigh then, loud enough for Naruto to hear, loud enough that Sasuke must have wanted Naruto to hear him do it. Then he closed his eyes for a long moment, because it wouldn't be a mission with just the two of them if Sasuke didn't stop for a moment to be as dramatic as possible. "It wasn't supposed to snow."

Naruto suddenly had a flash of Sasuke at twelve, stubborn and petulant in a rare moment of shared aggravation over their latest mission. Naruto's mouth was burning from the cold, but he just couldn't seem to stop. "I know."

Sasuke sent him a glance like somehow Naruto was responsible for all of this out of season snow. "So, what? We just set up camp? Give up?"

"You're so dramatic, it's cold as hell. We can easily get there in the morning."

Sasuke said nothing and looked away, which was as good of an answer as Naruto knew he would get. For a moment he relished a rare moment of winning an argument between them, but then Naruto remembered that they definitely hadn't packed for the snow. So there had been no real reason for a tent.

Their eyes met, and Sasuke seemed to just know. "Remind me to never take a last minute mission with you again."

"Come on, it's not that bad. We can–" Naruto paused to look around, finding white in all directions and nothing that could remotely pass for shelter "–move the snow from under a tree? Huddle for warmth?"

Sasuke's eye twitched. "Just keep moving. I'm not freezing to death with you on some pointless mission."

"But I'm tired," Naruto couldn't help but whine.

"Are you seriously pouting?" Sasuke snapped, voice done. "You won't be able to sleep anyway, it's literally freezing. You've missed a night for less."

Sasuke didn't wait for his response and just started walking again, eyes once again locked on all the endless snow before them. Naruto watched Sasuke's back, wondering why he'd ever let himself imagine for a moment that this could go any other way. Naruto knew exactly who he was looking at after all.

Strays hissed at most people who went near them, let alone those who dared to reach out and try to make them stay where they didn't want to be.

Sasuke being here again had to be enough.

*

Naruto loved ramen to what he knew some people would say was an excessive extent, but it really was the perfect meal. It could be light when you needed a quick fix in the summer, and heavy and filling in the winter. Plus it just tasted really  _ really  _ good. Somehow it was always exactly what Naruto needed.

Sasuke wasn't anything like ramen. 

He would be the bits of tofu floating in it, maybe the vegetables laid out over the top that Naruto always ignored, but never the good parts.

"You never appreciate this you know."

Sasuke shot him a completely unimpressed look, still halfheartedly poking around his bowl. "What?"

"This!" Naruto gestured with his chopsticks between both of their bowls, his close to empty and Sasuke's still hardly touched. "This is the best meal in the village you know, show it some respect."

"Show it–" Sasuke shook his head, expression clearly barely staying in place before suddenly it broke, a laugh escaping him that Naruto wanted to reach out and catch for himself. "You're such a moron."

"What?" Naruto asked, hardly hearing himself speak as he took in the small smile still lingering on Sasuke's mouth. It was impossible for him not to smile back, even if Sasuke was only laughing at him. Naruto would take being the but of the joke everyday forever if it meant he got to see this. "Name a better place to eat then."

Shaking his head, Sasuke looked straight ahead again, his expression as fond as Naruto had ever seen it. "Anything I say you'll just argue with me, just finish your bowl so we can go."

"What, you mean I can't get another one?"

Sasuke sighed before raising his hand, giving a small wave to get the old man's attention. "Hey, can we get one to go? Thanks."

Naruto just blinked for a moment. 

Him and Sasuke getting ramen together wasn't new, and neither was this discussion. But at this point Sasuke was supposed to try and argue him into eating literally anything else, and then Naruto would shout out his order for a bowl to go over Sasuke's rant that Naruto was going to die if he didn't eat a vegetable soon. 

Sasuke wasn't looking at him now, chin resting on his palm slightly turned away from Naruto, but he couldn't hide the pink slowly deepinging to red that touched his ears. 

Knowing Sasuke would hate it, Naruto reached out and pinched the edge of his ear, leaning back right away when Sasuke predictably reached up to try and hit his hand away. But Sasuke was looking back at him again after that, and Naruto could feel his smile go as soft as snow. He wasn't sure he'd ever seen Sasuke blush so hard, embarrassed over such a small thing Naruto had to stop himself from laughing, knowing it would be taken the wrong way. "Thanks Sasuke."

Sasuke rolled his eyes and turned his head away again, just barely pouting. "You were going to anyway, might as well skip a pointless argument. Let your insides rot if you want."

"I will, thank you very much."

Even though he tried to hide it, Naruto could see Sasuke fighting to hold back a smile. Naruto wanted a thousand things at once, and none of them involved waiting for his next bowl of ramen. But of course they did wait, and Naruto didn't do a single one, he just kept watching the side of Sasuke's face as they both pretended that they didn't know that he was. 

"You know," Naruto started when they were walking back, his bag of to-go swinging next to him as they went, "I think I was wrong, you are like ramen Sasuke."

Sasuke stopped walking for half a step before he started again, not looking back at Naruto. 

"Because–"

"Please save my ears from whatever you're about to say."

Naruto laughed, too loud for the quiet dusk that had settled on the street around them. "What? Come on."

"Excuse me for not wanting to be compared to noodles."

"Not even when it's my favorite?"

"Especially then."

Naruto caught up to Sasuke in a few quick steps and threw an arm over his shoulders, pulling Sasuke just a bit closer as they walked. Normally he would have left it there, probably wouldn't have even come over to hold Sasuke against him like this, but Naruto still felt like he was floating on the waves from Sasuke's earlier smile, like he could have reached up and plucked the moon from the sky if Sasuke only asked him to. 

Maybe he just wanted Sasuke to know how happy he made him.

"I can feel you looking at me."

"Probably because I am." Sasuke tensed up under his arm, but still made no move to pull away. Naruto squeezed Sasuke's shoulder as he glanced at his pink stained ear. "You are my other favorite after all."

"I–" Sasuke cut himself off with an affronted sound, quickly and roughly shrugging off Naruto's arm. Stopping he crossed his arms, moving his hands to his hips before crossing his arms again, letting out a long sigh as their eyes met. "Fine, tell me."

"What?" Embarrassment finally touched him, and Naruto found himself letting out a nervous laugh as he scratched at the back of his head. "It's dumb, I wasn't actually gonna say it."

"Too bad," Sasuke snapped, brittle and still clearly embarrassed, "I want to know now."

"It's just–" Naruto broke off with another short laugh that showed exactly how nervous he was now. It felt like he wasn't even sure what point he'd been thinking of early, every comparison that came to mind now more impossible to say than the last, obvious and yet impossible to grasp. "It's nothing. I'm tired, let's go back."

Sasuke looked something close to incredulous. "No you're not. You always say whatever pops into your head, so I can't imagine what you're thinking about now."

It was Naruto's turn to feel himself go flushed, turning away as he started walking back. "Whatever Sasuke, I'll see you tomorrow."

But in a moment of strange, blinding role reversal, Sasuke ran after him. 

"Hey," he said as his hand closed around Naruto's wrist, "Wait a second."

Naruto turned back before he thought to do so, but he couldn't bring himself to actually be surprised. He always turned back for Sasuke. "You're just gonna get embarrassed."

Sasuke shrugged, already embarrassed all over and Naruto couldn't help wondering if anyone else would have been able to tell just how much or if it was only him, the last person who could really look at Sasuke and just know. Maybe he was a fool to believe he understood Sasuke as much as he did, given how little they'd truly talked about anything, but Naruto didn't feel like he was wrong. Since Sasuke had come back Naruto had hardly felt truly wrong about anything, content like he'd never been before, like he'd never dreamed he could reach until he became Hokage. 

But he really shouldn't have been surprised at all. Everything always shifted inside of him when it came to Sasuke.

"I was just gonna say that I'm the only one who can really appreciate you." Naruto cleared his throat, telling himself he wasn't nervous and failing miserably. "You know, like I'm the only one who really appreciates ramen."

Sasuke looked at him for a long moment, expression blank. "Yeah, I got that."

"I was gonna say it as kind of a joke, but then I realized it wasn't really a joke. So then I didn't say it." Naruto had done everything but clamp his own hand over his mouth to stop, but for some reason the words just kept coming. "Well I did just now, but yeah. Things have obviously slipped into awkward, like I thought they would. You know, you should really try listening to me sometimes and just–"

"Stop talking."

"Right."

Sasuke was glaring, but it had never felt less effective. He looked like he could barely even bring himself to keep doing it. "Let's just–" 

Naruto watched Sasuke seemingly freeze mid sentence before he sighed, heavy and light all at once before he simply turned and started to walk back down the road. Naruto usually hated when Sasuke ran away from one of their conversations like this, but now he was more relieved than he could say, following quietly after Sasuke. 

He couldn't remember the last time he'd felt near this level of embarrassment, but Sasuke looked just the same, maybe even worse.

It was impossible not to spend the entire walk back thinking about why, some part of him knowing that he really didn't need to wonder at all.

*

The very first time Naruto saw Sasuke he'd been far off, just a smudge of a person with how he was curled in on himself, but Naruto hadn't been able to look away. There had been something there he'd recognized, that even at that young age he hadn't been able to turn away from. He'd never seen it so clearly from someone else before, let alone someone who seemed like they could have been just like him..

Of course Naruto knew what it was now, what had already taken hold of them both long before it should have, but loneliness never cared about when and should, it just was. Sasuke's loneliness was tangled up in grief, deeper and farther reaching than Naruto knew how to imagine while his own just was, a constant Naruto hadn't known there was an escape from to even hope for.

Years later when Sasuke had screamed that same loneliness back at him like it was every reason Naruto wouldn't be able to understand him had felt like one of the most impossible moments of his life. Loneliness being what pushed Sasuke to pull away while it only made Naruto want to cling to whatever bit of Sasuke he could reach that much more made a painful amount of sense, even back then. Naruto might not know the specific pains of getting there for Sasuke, but he'd known the way years of loneliness could eat away at someone, at everyone who it dared to touch.

How was he supposed to believe what Sasuke said, when Naruto had seemed to always know in his heart that all they really needed was each other?

They had each other now, in every way Naruto had thought to mean it back then, but the loneliness was still there for them both, lingering on the air. Naruto had never imagined he could still feel like such a failure with Sasuke after so long, but maybe he'd really only failed himself. After everything he'd demanded from Sasuke over the years Naruto could only feel like a hypocrite now, but it was a strange thing, to only realize the truth of his own dishonestly years after the fact. Was it even a lie if Naruto was only realizing it for himself now?

"You know, I think you might have been right about me all along."

Sasuke made a soft sound, vaguely curious.

Naruto glanced away from the sky stretched out before them to Sasuke sitting on the rocks by his side. He was beautiful, completely and undeniably. Naruto's chest felt that same swaying tide, that same far off star threatening to finally burn too bright. He knew he would never want to look away. "I am a moron."

A rare flash of pure surprise came over Sasuke as he looked over, and then something like a smile was left, only in his eyes and only there if you knew how to see it. "And what brought on this great realization?"

"I–" Naruto quickly realized he hadn't thought this through at all, but looking at Sasuke now and finally _knowing_ what it was that had been flooding his chest all these years made it feel impossible to keep it inside for another minute, even another second.

Sasuke looked focused now, something almost close to worried. "Did something happen?"

"No," Naruto said in a rush, "I'm fine, nothing's wrong I just–I realized something."

Sasuke looked back at him, raising an eyebrow when Naruto didn't keep going. "Which was?"

The wind was gently passing over them, pulling Sasuke's dark hair in soft strands across his face. Naruto wanted to reach out and tuck it behind Sasuke's ear, to already know what it felt like to do it, to know that he would do it a thousand times more. "I think you're it for me."

"What?" Sasuke's voice went strained, looking away only to turn back as soon as he did, eyes wide with clear disbelief.

"I think you're it for me," Naruto said again, softer, breathing out some of the tension from his frame. "I think it's always been you."

"What do you mean, it?" But it sounded like Sasuke already knew, and the look in his eyes said the same thing.

"It it." Naruto shrugged, a smile starting to break out across his face. "Like, we should kiss sometimes it, maybe hold hands after I kick your ass in training it."

Naruto knew he should have been nervous, terrified even, but the feeling just wasn't there. Sasuke didn't look disgusted or offended, and some part of Naruto had always known that he wouldn't be. Naruto reached out and finally did what he'd been imagining, finding hair that felt like anyone else's beneath his fingers as he tucked it behind Sasuke's ear. He'd always imagined it would be soft, like the silk it so often resembled, but it was only hair. 

It was just Sasuke.

Naruto couldn't be surprised when Sasuke pulled back and turned away, but it didn't feel great either. It never did, and as familiar a pain as it was, somehow it always hurt just the same. "You don't have to say anything, just don't leave yet."

Sasuke let out a shaking breath, meeting Naruto's eyes for a moment before he looked away again. "I'm not leaving."

Breathing was hard, but Naruto made himself keep doing it. "Okay."

"I just didn't think you would ever really say that." Sasuke sounded as lost as he looked, like he was moments from drifting away.

"What do you mean?"

But Sasuke didn't go on, shaking his head in a hardly there motion while still refusing to meet Naruto's eyes. 

Naruto didn't need him to turn to see how clearly embarrassed Sasuke was. "Do you wish I hadn't said anything?"

Sasuke turned his face away completely, chin resting on his own shoulder. "I didn't say that."

That added weight left Naruto's chest as a smile took over his face, laying back against the rocks with an easy sigh. As long as Sasuke wasn't trying to push him away Naruto couldn't feel like he'd made a mistake, especially now when they were still so close. Having Sasuke by his side again made the idea of waiting for a while feel easy, almost like a gift really. All Naruto had ever really wanted was for them to have more time, and Sasuke had been back long enough for it to have finally sunk in; they really had forever now. 

Even if Sasuke never ended up wanting him back this way Naruto knew he would be okay, that even the sight of Sasuke in the morning was still enough to make Naruto feel like he was floating just above the ground all day. 

Sasuke always made Naruto feel like he could do anything. 

"I'm not saying no," Sasuke finally said after a pause so long anyone else would have thought the conversation was over, "I just need–I can't just–"

"Sasuke, it's fine." Pushing himself up, Naruto scooted over until he was sitting right next to Sasuke, leaning forward until there was no way Sasuke couldn't at least see him from the corner of his eye. "I know I'm not known for being the most patient person, but I know you. You can go brood about it, it's alright."

That got Sasuke to look back over, with a glare that didn't match the amusement behind his eyes. "This isn't a joke."

"I know that." Naruto felt his mouth twitch all the same, a laugh that refused to listen to him ready to burst out. 

Sasuke let out a low, exasperated sigh. "You're literally trying not to laugh."

"Sorry," Naruto said, not truly sorry at all, "I'm just happy, I guess."

Sasuke's expression flickered through too much for Naruto to keep track of, confusion finally winning out in the end. "Why? I didn't even–I haven't said anything."

"I'm happy I told you, I'm happy you didn't run away the moment I did, I'm happy that we're still here together so I can tell you at all." Naruto's face was beginning to burn, but embarrassment felt unimportant and far away. "I'm just happy."

Sasuke looked like he was related to a tomato he was so red now, biting his bottom lip as he shook his head and turned away again. He sounded annoyed, but not enough to cover up the fondness buried beneath it all. He looked as far from lonely as someone could. "And a moron."

Naruto finally let the laugh escape. "And a moron."

*

Looking at Naruto felt like looking at the sun. It was a thought that irritated Sasuke like nothing else, but he just couldn't seem to make himself stop having it. It should have been over one of the many obvious reasons, Naruto's hair or clothes or ridiculously loud voice, but it never was. Sasuke couldn't even claim it for a secret overly sentimental thought on Naruto's smile. 

The sun just was, constant even when you couldn't see it, not unchanging but always  _ always  _ there. Sasuke didn't like admitting he couldn't live without something, but the sun was the sun, and trying to live without it hadn't really been living at all. It rose everyday all the same, and Sasuke was so tired of pretending he couldn't feel the light on his skin.

Somehow knowing Naruto felt the same way only made it worse, like Sasuke was moments away from burning alive each time their eyes met, but maybe he just didn't know how to recognize what better felt like anymore. Sasuke still couldn't say what had kept him from reaching back for Naruto that day, but regret didn't feel like a big enough word. Bringing it up himself felt impossible now, and Naruto seemed happy to let things go on like they were. 

But things weren't quite the same anymore, and even Sasuke couldn't claim to have missed the change. 

Naruto lingered where he never would have before, stood closer, looks that only seemed to go on longer and longer. Sasuke didn't do a thing about it, good or bad. Acknowledgement felt bigger than dangerous, and it was the first step to any reaction Sasuke could have. Doing nothing was a response all on it's own, but Sasuke refused to think about what Naruto must have seen as the reason why behind it. The idea that Naruto knew why he was being this way when Sasuke was still lost inside was almost too good of a joke, the kind that quickly stopped being funny to decay into nothing but a strange, old sadness. 

At least that was what Sasuke had been letting himself believe, what he had realized had been easy to let himself believe only when he knew Naruto would continue to be by his side day after day. More than anything Sasuke just didn't want the battle waging away inside of him to show on his face, but if the glances that Naruto kept shooting his way were anything to go by, Sasuke knew that he'd failed spectacularly. When the goal was keeping anything from Naruto all he seemed to do now was fail. 

"I can't believe they won't just let us take this mission together." 

Sasuke didn’t bother to reply, close to losing count of just how many times Naruto had said something similar since learning who he was being sent out with on his next mission. Or more truthfully who wouldn’t be with him. 

“Maybe if I went back and–”

“Naruto,” Sasuke cut in, “You know it’s pointless. It’s obvious why I can’t go on this mission.”

A flash of something came over Naruto’s face as he stopped walking all together, turning to face Sasuke fully. “Fine, but why do I have to go? There are so many capable–”

“No one they trust as much as you.”

For once Naruto was the one with nothing to say, leveling Sasuke with a lingering look full of too much before he turned forward and started walking again. They went the rest of the way in silence until suddenly they were right there at the gate, the place they would part for at the minimum weeks, but more likely months. Sasuke understood exactly why things had ended up this way, but understanding didn’t lessen any of the ugly dread filling him up inside. Even just thinking it felt awful and weak in the worst ways, but Sasuke didn’t know how he would bear it, being here without Naruto for so long. It felt quietly impossible like only the worst things did.

Naruto turned back to him with a strained smile, nerves mirroring Sasuke’s own from every corner of his expression. He was the one leaving, on what neither of them could deny was a dangerous mission and yet he looked for no comfort for himself, worried for Sasuke just like always. 

Suddenly all Sasuke could think of were all the years Naruto had spent alone, with and without him. At the end of the day all Naruto really wanted from him was honesty, such a small thing compared to everything else. Sasuke had twisted it up into an impassable mountain inside himself, but looking at Naruto now it was hard to remember all the reasons why. Maybe for once he could just let a moment between them be, easy like the afternoon sun with none of the lingering irritation on his skin. 

Ignoring everything that wasn’t Naruto, Sasuke made himself step closer. “Stop worrying.”

“I’m not,” Naruto said, the worry in his voice clear.

“Naruto.” Sasuke spoke as quietly as he could manage through his nerves, reaching out to hold Naruto's hand like it was easy, like it wasn’t as close to the first time as Sasuke could bear to think about. Sasuke squeezed Naruto’s hand, willing him to understand everything Sasuke didn’t have words for yet. “I’ll be fine. We’ll both be fine.”

Some of the tension left Naruto’s frame, a smile coming that much more naturally over his face but Sasuke could still see the doubt, though he knew Naruto would die before calling it that himself. Sasuke had no idea if it would make Naruto feel better or not, but it was the only honest thing left inside himself for him to find. A distant, rational part of himself knew that Naruto wanted this, he  _ knew _ , but it felt far away next to how unbearably close Naruto was now. Somehow Sasuke leaned in even closer still, squeezing Naruto’s hand as he intertwined their fingers, lost in the widening blue of his eyes. 

Sasuke only managed to close his eyes just as their lips pressed together, a light touch that his nerves didn’t know how to take. His hand shook in Naruto’s like he was the one shocked at being kissed, but in some ways Sasuke was, half stuck in disbelief that he was doing this at all while knowing just how real it had to be. Naruto kissing him back was everything Sasuke wanted, everything he wasn’t ready for. Nothing he’d ever imagined himself had felt this way, and no one but Naruto could push Sasuke into a moment like this, everything he’d told himself to hate for so long. Finding out it was even better than his most indulgent fantasies left Sasuke adrift inside, honestly forgetting himself for the first time in years until the moment Naruto pulled back to breathe.

It took a moment for Sasuke’s eyes to open again, and then all his nerves wanted was for him to slam them closed again at the sight before him. No one should have been able to look that happy because of him, especially someone like Naruto.

“I’m supposed to just leave now?” Naruto’s voice was almost quiet, eyes moving endlessly over Sasuke’s face. “After that?”

Somehow Sasuke managed to keep his voice even, ignoring his sweaty palm pressed against Naruto’s and the blush he could feel burning across his face. Smiling was impossible, but Sasuke tried to show something, to for once give Naruto back even the smallest piece of what he’d given away. “I’ll be here when you get back.”

“Yeah.” Naruto’s smile broke over his face like the sunrise, eclipsing the setting sun behind him. He reached out and just barely touched Sasuke’s jaw, hand warm against Sasuke’s chilled skin. “I guess you will be.”

Sasuke stayed by the gates until Naruto and his team disappeared from view, and then for a while longer still, watching the last bit of the sun disappear behind the trees. Looking up at the sky on his way back Sasuke saw that it was already dotted with stars, some near and bright, others dim and far away. Maybe there was a different version of him out there for each one.

Life had always felt unbearlby cruel, much too long and over before anyone could really live at all, but the idea of a thousand different versions of himself out there, loving with every rise and fall of the sun made it all almost feel worth it. 

  
  
  
  
  



End file.
